A common word...

http://acommonword.com

A common word is a declaration of the common ground between Muslims and Christians that was written by 138 Muslim clerics, scholars and intellectuals based on the two commandments (love of one god, and being good to ones' neighbour) which is espoused by both religions. It came in the aftermath of the Pope's Regensburg Address in 2006 which inflamed many by its different inferences of violence and Islam.

It is an interesting document however it does shortchange the necessity to have open communication towards all religions most importantly maybe with Judaism, which as an Abrahamic religion is comprised of the same notions. Not to mention the ties in the middle east between these three religions. There are commentaries from Jewish scholars and leaders in response to this which is quite positive in the side notes. Jewish scholars had in the past also had a document similar to this as well which can be downloaded on the site. Overall it shows at least that all scholars/clerics/intellectuals are not as one sided as they seem, having seen this many get together to write this document and then to have so many others comment on it is a very positive notion.

Most interesting to me is the link to a statement by Madeline Albright to the Committee on Foreign Relations in Washington D.C. which talks of America's questioning of how it should engage with the Muslim communities of the world. The new flavour of government in the United States is certainly taking a step back from the politics of its past, at least in terms of what its putting out there for the general public to see.

Check out her speech here:http://acommonword.com/en/images/albrighttestimony090226p.pdf

She uses words like: diplomacy, dialogue, to enhance mutual understanding etc...which is dramatically different from the past words of terrorism, hostility and Jihadist threat. It focuses on the necessity of seeing the religion of Islam separately from the fundamentalism that is the precursor to the terrorism that we are seeing being linked with Muslims. It pinpoints one thing that I always wondered if the United States recognized, and that is that most fundamentalism has roots in a local mindset as opposed to an international one. It is only through our (by this I mean Western or American) threat via bombs/sanctions that we make it an international cause, because as much as we'd like to see ourselves as being the greater society, it is not until we harm someone on the other side of the world that they seek to harm us.

What if suddenly those of us in Canada due to economic depression or local unrest decided that our unemployment was directly related to having all our manufactured goods coming from China and then suddenly we were bombed by China? What would we do? Would there be enough unrest in rural areas to make something happen? Are our values and thoughts different enough to separate the action from the community/religion/state? Take yourself outside of our metropolitan mindset and think for a second if we are any different from the terrorists we abhor.

Keep in mind that as per Maclean's fewer than one in three Canadians can find it in their hearts to see Islam or Sikhism in a favourable light. The statistics are a bit horrifying but I can see how it is true, how many people outside of metropolitan areas (or even in them) can say that they have a good understanding of major religions but they really don't have enough understanding to separate the propaganda they see in the media from what the religion actually entails. Very few do, and its not just me, Maclean's and Angus Reid agree with me. The study points again to the fact that as much as we consider ourselves a "multicultural" country we are still not far past other countries. We have just as much disregard for other peoples' religions, values, and cultures as the average American, French or German citizen. We simply hide it better than others, at least until there is a poll involved.

Read it here...http://www2.macleans.ca/2009/04/28/what-canadians-think-of-sikhs-jews-christians-muslims/

So as certain things change, such as political engagement towards the Muslim community, its important to note that the propaganda of past governments are not so easily erased. You cannot change the temperature of the public opinion so easily. The power of persuasion doesn't always work both ways because the slate is only clean once.